Episode 006: "Hitting Singles"

"Hitting Singles” It is no secret that I have been training to become a storyteller. Although I have only been sharing my stories for the past 5 months or so, I have been studying, researching and prating for over 2 years. For example, last week I spent 4 hours (a 21/2 hour movie) watching “The Firm” with Tom cruise while I listened to “The Hero’s 2 Journeys” so that I could breakdown the story formula. I’m not going to lie, it has been tough. I’m aware that adding a new skill doesn’t happen overnight, by working on it daily I will only get better. Understanding that I am not going to “hit a homerun” with everything I write is probably the number 1 reason I am still in the game. I’ve been focused on hitting singles. It reminds me of my golf game. Just to preface, I’m not very good at golf. I know this and accept it. So in order to enjoy myself on the course I started with something very simple. During a round my goal was to have: 1 good drive, 1 good fairway shot, 1 good pitch and 1 good putt. Not consecutively either. That sounds like a colossal failure right? To most people… Yes. But something interesting happened… Overtime I went out, I slowly got better. Going from a goal of having a minimum of 4 good shots, to 1 par per round and now put to 3 pars per round. Yes, I’m still not very good but instead of focusing on the entire round, I am able to focus on each shot. While I’m still not very good, I have gotten much better. Same thing with my stories. Instead of trying to go from beginner to expert overnight, writing a NY Times best seller, I’m focused on today’s story and making it the best I can. Then tomorrow, I will take what I’ve learned today and apply it to tomorrow’s story. Obviously I do want to master the craft of storytelling but I know it won’t come from constantly swinging for the fences. That is why I will continue to focus on… “Hitting Singles”